Atomic Energy Commission
Dean was appointed by President Harry S. Truman as one of the original Commissioners of the AEC in May 1949, by which time McMahon had become Senator (in 1944), author of the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, and chair of the Joint Atomic Energy Committee of Congress. Dean was then appointed as the second Chairman of the AEC beginning in May 1950, following David Lilienthal, again with McMahon's backing. As early as 1950, Dean advocated for the appointment of a Presidential Science Advisor and science advisory task force. Dean served at the time of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's creation in 1952. During Dean's tenure as Chairman, McCarthyism reached its peak. Robert Oppenheimer came under attack by Lewis Strauss, Edward Teller and others for his alleged foot-dragging at Los Alamos. Dean defended Oppenheimer. As Cold War tensions heightened and the Korean War raged on, Dean led a massive industrialization of the United States nuclear facilities. The hydrogen bomb, a nuclear weapon of massive and unprecedented force, was perfected during his tenure as Chairman with the detonation of the Ivy Mike hydrogen bomb, based on Edward Teller's design in October 1952. Dean served for a brief period under President Eisenhower as well, staying until the completion of his term on June 30, 1953.
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Famous quotes containing the words atomic energy, atomic, energy and/or commission:
“The pace of science forces the pace of technique. Theoretical physics forces atomic energy on us; the successful production of the fission bomb forces upon us the manufacture of the hydrogen bomb. We do not choose our problems, we do not choose our products; we are pushed, we are forced—by what? By a system which has no purpose and goal transcending it, and which makes man its appendix.”
—Erich Fromm (1900–1980)
“When man entered the atomic age, he opened a door into a new world. What we eventually find in that new world, nobody can predict.”
—Ted Sherdeman. Gordon Douglas. Dr. Medford (Edmund Gwenn)
“There are no accidents, only nature throwing her weight around. Even the bomb merely releases energy that nature has put there. Nuclear war would be just a spark in the grandeur of space. Nor can radiation “alter” nature: she will absorb it all. After the bomb, nature will pick up the cards we have spilled, shuffle them, and begin her game again.”
—Camille Paglia (b. 1947)
“It is impossible to calculate the moral mischief, if I may so express it, that mental lying has produced in society. When a man has so far corrupted and prostituted the chastity of his mind as to subscribe his professional belief to things he does not believe he has prepared himself for the commission of every other crime.”
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809)